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In the world of Gintama, anything odd that happened could easily be written off as just the world being crazy. It didn’t really matter, the events that occurred because of weird things were what actually mattered. I mean, when you’ve got an Ancient Japan setting already invaded by aliens, what’s the weirdest that could happen? It’s already a mess of sci-fi and historical fiction and nobody can tell what the time period is supposed to be anymore.
That didn’t really explain, however, why Shinpachi and Kagura found themselves in the middle of a bloody battlefield, but then again, what would?
“OIIIII!!” Shinpachi screeched, slipping naturally into his straight-man character. “What’s with that explanation? What?”
“Didn’t you just hear, yup?” Kagura scoffed, picking at her nose. “Plus, this isn’t even part of the anime. Don’t mind it so much, yep.”
“Huh? Did I just hear that properly? Kagura-chan. You aren’t supposed to be breaking the fourth wall this early.”
Kagura revealed a booger on her finger and flicked it aside.”Who cares, yep? This isn’t even canon. It probably won’t even be remembered afterwards.”
The two looked around, as if suddenly remembering that they were in the middle of a battlefield… specifically the remains of one. Corpses littered every inch of the ground, the overwhelming smell of blood everywhere, rubbing itself in their noses. Shouldn’t we have done this earlier? Shinpachi thought. Setting is important, after all. Can’t believe we’re in the hands of such an incompetent writer.
It was, not to be understated, a bloodbath. Like a storm passed through but instead of the sweet relief of water and familiar coolness, dark red-brown sloshed down coating everything. Weapons stuck out of the ground in every which direction, some laying down and some sticking out of the ground; but most sickeningly… some sticking out from a body part or piece of armor. They didn’t even want to look at the faces, but they were there, haunting, eyes open, horrified, staring at death but already lifeless and glazed over.
Shinpachi repressed the urge to let out all of his lunch through his mouth, as he felt the bile building up at the back of his throat. He took a large gulp and started breathing through his mouth, hoping the smell of gunpowder, ashes, iron and rust wouldn’t get into his lungs so much that way.
The smell of blood was somewhat familiar to Kagura, but sickening nonetheless; and never before had she seen so much of it. To distract herself, she picked her nose.
“Anyways,” started Kagura, scrunching up her nose. “Where is our dumb perm-headed boss? Everything has to be about him, since he’s the main character, yet he’s probably somewhere wasting all his money on dumb parfaits and pachinko, yup.”
The two took another look around, trying to see past all the death.
“Ah,” Shinpachi exclaimed unenthusiastically as he pointed in one direction. “I see a silver perm over there, but it looks, kind of, um… brown in some spots, actually.”
“Let’s go to Gin-chan, yup!” Kagura raced off in the direction.
Shinpachi struggled to catch up, but when he did, Kagura seemed to have stopped, a distance away from the silver-headed samurai they knew so well. “Kagura-chan? What’s wrong?” he inquired.
“Gin-chan… is a child, yup.” she said, with a kind of blank look of surprise on her face.
“Huh?” Shinpachi adjusted his glasses. It was true. The silver head he saw was attached to a small body in a light blue, blood-stained yukata. There was grime on almost every inch of the child’s body, blood caking areas on his legs and arms and hair. The child, he noticed, was lying down carelessly on top of a pile of corpses, clutching an old, sheathed katana. The bindings on the handle seemed faded and slightly frayed.
“It’s still Gin-san though, right?” Shinpachi said, uneasily. “Maybe we should go help him out. He’s laying down. Is he injured?”
The two carefully walked towards the bed of corpses where the silver-headed kid was lying. As they approached, they saw that he actually had a small trail of drool on his gaunt, starved face. So he must’ve been sleeping.
The Yato approached quietly (surprising considering she had the delicacy of an elephant at most times) and nudged the child’s shoulder.
Blood-red eyes shot open and the child hopped to his feet and back several feet in an inhuman speed, within a fraction of a second. His hand was on the old katana and the ring of metal cried out as he slowly unsheathed it halfway.
Shinpachi panicked for a second, looking at the crimson eyes of the child. They were cold, hard, calculating. They didn’t even waste a second staring through the glasses and into the teenager’s soul.
“Gin-chan?” Kagura still had a hand up after nudging him awake.
“Who’s Gin?” the child asked.
“Someone we’re looking for,” Shinpachi interrupted, hurriedly. The Yato girl looked at him, confused for a second. Shinpachi stared back in desperation, hoping to communicate to her. If we move carelessly, we will die.
Kagura seemed to have gotten the message, as she nodded slightly.
Luckily, Shinpachi’s words and show of fear was enough to calm the child a bit, as he slowly sheathed the bloodied katana. “Go look for your friend. Get away from me.”
With that, the child walked off, the sunset at his back. The red sky eerily shone over him.
“Um, if you don’t mind me asking,” Shinpachi apprehensively started, “Where do you plan to go?”
The child didn’t stop walking. “The corpses won’t keep me alive much longer. The village nearby might have some shelter from the coming rain. If you don’t want to catch a cold and die, I recommend you go home too.”
‘The corpses won’t keep me alive any longer’? What does he mean? Shinpachi stared at the child, puzzled. Next to him, Kagura began walking, following the child.
“What’re you doing, Pattsuan?” she shouted behind her. “You heard him. Let’s go.”
Shinpachi cursed a tiny bit at the thought of being left alone again and raced after the back of the Yato girl.
When they reached the village following the child, it appeared deserted. If people did see them, they quickly closed their doors, windows, and anything open as the child walked through. In confusion, Kagura and Shinpachi stopped and looked around. The people seemed, afraid, almost, as if a gang had come for some extortion or something. When they turned around to look for their companion again, the silver-head was gone.
As if on cue, the doors opened again, the window shutters pulled away. Light filtered out of houses welcomingly once again, as whispers started up and eventually talking and laughing flooded the streets. A middle-aged woman in a nice pink kimono even walked up to them.
“New faces, I see! Who might you two young’uns be?”
Shinpachi snapped out of his daze. “Ah, nice to meet you! My name is Shimura Shinpachi, and this here is my friend, Kagura.”
“Oh, hello then!” The lady replied. “I’m Hanako. I live in that house over there.” She jabbed a finger over at an average wooden house. “I was just returning. How nice to see some new people.”
Shinpachi looked down and noticed that she was carrying a bag of fresh produce. “Oh, miss, please let me help you with your groceries,” he said.
“Oh, how nice! Thank you so much.”
In a few minutes, they had been sitting inside Hanako’s house. She had invited them inside for dinner out of gratitude for Shinpachi’s kindness.
“You really didn’t need to do this, Hanako-san,” Shinpachi said sheepishly.
“Nonsense!” She replied, warm-heartedly. ”It’s the least I could do for a kind young man like you who helped out this old lady.”
She came out with three trays, each with a bowl of rice and a side of boiled vegetables and fish. “It would’ve been cruel to leave you two kids outside for the night, anyways.”
Kagura happily chomped on her food like a black hole, as Shinpachi asked, “what do you mean?”
Hanako sighed. “The war’s been reaching pretty far, so it wouldn’t be a surprise if this village burned down suddenly one night,” she said forlornly. “Even though most of us have lived here for years, from our childhood, war takes that away in just mere minutes. A sad thing, it truly is.”
Shinpachi sighed. So they were in the middle of the Joui war, 20-some years ago. Now that he had a confirmation for the time, he had another nagging matter on his mind. “Thanks again, Hanako-san. But I couldn’t help but notice that when Gi-- sorry, the white-haired boy passed through, everybody made themselves scarce. What was that about?”
Hanako looked at Shinpachi, but her kind smile was gone. What replaced it on her face was an expression of pure disgust and hatred, with a hint of fear. Shinpachi shuddered a the sight. Two-faced people did exist in the world after all.
“Guess you really must be new. Nobody within many miles of this warzone doesn’t know about it. You can’t even call it a boy ,” she scowled. “That creature can’t be human. It has to be some kind of Amanto parading around as a human.”
At this, Kagura’s eyes became shadowed and she silently stopped eating. This didn’t go unnoticed by the glasses boy, who continued to listen intently out of curiosity. Shinpachi finally understood the reason behind the whispers in the street.
Hanako continued. “I haven’t actually seen it before, but rumor is that it has blood-red eyes, pale skin, and white hair. Aside from rumors, not much is known, but you don’t even need the rumors to know that you need to stay away from it . They say it’s a ghost. But it couldn’t be. Not with what else it does.”
“With what it does?”
“It pillages from the corpses. Honestly. Can you believe that utter disrespect for the dead?!”
Ah, Shinpachi realized. That’s what he meant when he said the corpses wouldn’t keep him alive much longer.
“It doesn’t have a home, so it wanders around, stealing from corpses, eating bloodied rice-balls. Some people thought it was just a legend made up to scare the children away from the battlefields…
“But those of us, who live in these villages so close to the battlefields know, it is no legend or ghost. It’s a dirty demon . It has to be an Amanto, it steals food from human corpses, lives from those who approach it.
Shinpachi gulped. Kagura appeared to be dangerously angry, but he couldn’t stop listening.
“That’s his name. The corpse-eating demon. I’d advise you to run the other direction if you see it. Who knows, it might just steal your life. Anyways, most of us are just absolutely sure that it’s an Amanto that looks like a human. How terrifying… Amanto could just sneak into our lives right under our noses if they look like that demon.”
Kagura had heard enough. A startling crack was heard as her chopsticks snapped inside her palm.
Uh-oh , Shinpachi thought. Here it comes.
“An Amanto? A demon?” Kagura slowly rose from her seat, towering and menacing even as a 14-year old girl. Then, with one swift stomp, she broke the entire table into pieces, leaving a crater in the tatami mat. Hanako cowered, shuffling back from where she sat a few feet. “Gin-chan’s neither of those things. He may not be yet, but he’ll become someone who’s looked up to, and maybe he’ll be hopeless, but he’ll be loved, yup. He doesn’t deserve the moniker of a demon. He’s still a f*cking child.”
Hanako looked like she had tears in her eyes at this point, shaking in her fear at the girl’s approaching figure. Her strikingly blue eyes had become dark, shadowed by the anger pushing her brows together.
“Don’t you dare call him a demon again, just because you think he’s an Amanto or creepy or something because of his white perm. What do you think you know about him? Do you not have a home or anyone to care for you? Do you wander around trying to survive day by day just because everyone fears you for something as trivial as natural hair color?
Kagura’s eyes narrowed. “It’s because of dirty b*tches like you that I don’t like this world sometimes, yup. What a shame, a plague on a beautiful planet with clean air. If you took the time, you would see that’s he’s only an orphaned child of the war with nowhere to go.”
Hanako whimpered a bit. “But… but… ” in a bout of foolish confidence, she shouted back at the Yato’s face. “ It’s a demon ! It kills! You’re being the b*tch here! Why do you think you’re defending such a pointless, dirty Amanto ?!”
Kagura’s hand went through a wall, and Hanako gulped and went silent. “For your information… Gin-chan’s no Amanto.” Her grin sent shivers up both Hanako’s and Shinpachi’s backs. Her eyes were wide open, gleaming with slight blood lust and hatred. “ He’s no demon. He wouldn’t try to take you life, yup. He’s no Amanto. He wouldn’t be wanting to snap your neck right now, yup.”
“ But I am. And you have angered me .”
Hanako screamed bloody murder, and ran out through the door, as Kagura pulled her fist out of the ruined wall, eyes settling down. And then, she crouched down, hugging her knees for a bit before her hands found their way to the sides of her head.
“Shinpachi…” her quiet voice rang out. “This isn’t right. Nobody, not even Gin-chan, should have to live like this.”
Shinpachi nodded solemnly, his glasses covering his teary eyes. Just how much had Gin-san endured in his childhood to become that lazy man they knew so well?
Shinpachi sighed. “It can’t be helped. People are always unreasonable after all.”
“Shinpachi, let’s go find Gin-chan.” Kagura stood up slowly, eyes gaining a determined glint.
He nodded. “Let’s go.”
The rain seemed to have started. It was pouring buckets, but no white hair was anywhere to be found. It was quite lucky that the two still had their weapons on them, since both of them took cover from the rain under the Yato’s umbrella.
Shinpachi then saw it. In the dark shadows of an alleyway, where discarded brown tatami mats lied, small locks of silver hair peeked out from under the pile.
“Kagura-chan,” Shinpachi alerted the girl quietly. “There.”
Kagura turned, and walked up to the child. Surprisingly, the latter spoke first.
“I told you it would rain. Why’re you still out?” He huffed. “Idiots.”
Kagura scoffed. “I don’t want to hear that from you, you brat, yup.” She appeared scornful, yet still tipped her purple umbrella over the child’s wet head.
He smiled.
---
Before Shinpachi and Kagura had realized, they must’ve fallen asleep with the silver-haired boy, all of them underneath Kagura’s wide purple umbrella.
When they awoke again, however, child-Gin was gone and they weren’t in a dirty alleyway of a village anymore. They instead awoke just outside a forest, standing.
The fresh air from the nearby pond and the fluttering leaves of the forest reached their noses and ears, and they wanted to close their eyes again just to take in their peaceful surroundings. The sounds of shinai colliding reached their ears as well, and the cries of enthusiastic children rang.
They were pulled out of their daze by a smooth, kind, baritone voice. “Oh, might you two be travellers?”
The two of them opened their eyes to see a man in front of them, with beige-grayish brown hair that draped down to the middle of the man’s back. The man’s lips were curled upwards in a kind, gentle smile, his gray eyes looking at them.
“Oh, uh, yes! Nice to meet you, sir,” Shinpachi bowed politely. Kagura put a finger to her lip in pondering for a second, and then followed Shinpachi’s lead. “My name is Shimura Shinpachi, and this girl here is Kagura.”
The man chuckled. The warmth of his laughter flowed through the two children.They felt happy, safe in this man’s presence. They felt like they were home.
“No need for so many formalities, young man,” he said. “Just call me Shouyou. Yoshida Shouyou is my name. I run this temple school you see here.”
The two lifted their head and looked in front, to see white walls and a wooden signboard: “Shouka… Sonjuku?” Kagura read it.
“It’s a beautiful name, Shouyou-san,” Shinpachi remarked. “School born under a pine tree, yes?”
“Wow,” Kagura teased. “So smart, Patsuan.”
Shouyou smiled that warm, gentle smile of his again, though a hint of sorrow made its way into his eyes. “Isn’t it? Would you two like to come inside for some tea?”
Shinpachi’s eyes lit up like a child’s. “Could we?”
“Of course!” Shouyou replied, leading them through the gates. A nice small pond lined with stones could be seen next to the path in the front yard. Two vaguely familiar kids chased each other around, screaming, as their feet pounded on the wooden boards of the building in front of them.
“This is an impressive place,” Shinpachi said politely.
“Of course; I try my best to give these children a place.”
“So they’re the students?”
“Yes but… They’re mostly orphans, you see.
Shinpachi nodded. “How sad.”
“Right? I like to take them under my wing and help them. Just because they don’t have parents doesn’t mean they can’t good people in the future.”
They finally came into a nice 8 tatami mat room with a low table in the center.
“Please, make yourselves at home. I’ll be right back with some tea.” Shouyou then left the room.
Despite being in a foreign place, Kagura and Shinpachi couldn’t bring themselves to be wary in any way. The place was so inviting and kind. The two kind of just sat there in a daze, taking in the homey feeling of the school, not differently from how they did outside the school.
And again, not differently from when they were outside the school, they were shaken out of their daze by a voice, though this time accompanied by the quite sliding of the shoji.
“Shouyou,” drawled out a familiarly lazy voice. “The students at the dojo are fussi-- oh.”
The two stared at the new arrival, finding the comfortably familiar birds’ nest of a head of silver hair.
“Shouyou didn’t say there would be guests.” His hand rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. “Did he say where he was going?”
“Um,” Shinpachi said. This was the same child who glared death in the eye just a few hundred words back; he really couldn’t understand this drastic change. God dangit author, I thought making your incompetence in writing and pacing clear would make you a bit better at it, he cursed in his head. “He just went to get some tea,” he replied.
“‘Kay. Thanks,” The silver-haired child waved lazily before closing the shoji again.
Shinpachi could somewhat fill in the holes. Shouyou-san had probably taken Gin-san in, which would explain how Gin-san was living happily now. Kagura seemed to be smiling happily at the sight of the clean, almost normal-looking boy now. He was still carrying a katana around with him, but rather than for using it, the reason he kept it around appeared to be for guarding it.
Shinpachi smiled. This man that was being so kind to them was who save Gintoki from a childhood of eternal bloodshed and death, and he would be eternally grateful for the man.
“Hey, Gintoki, did you greet the guests properly?” Shouyou’s chiding voice came from a few rooms away.
“Why do I have to? They’re leaving soon anyways, aren’t they?”
“Gintoki. Manners.”
“Fine…”
The shoji door slid open again, as the silver-haired boy trailed behind Shouyou. “Alright, I’m back,” the man said, taking his seat. “Please, meet my oldest student here.”
Gintoki yawned and stuck a finger up his nose. “Yo, I’m Gintoki. Sakata Gintoki, student of Yoshida Shouyou and senior student at the Temple School, Shouka Sonjuku.”
A vein popped out of Kagura’s face. “Rude brat. Don’t pick your nose when talking to a lady, yup.”
“Where’s the lady? I just see a gorilla girl,” Gintoki taunted, flicking a booger in the Yato’s direction.
“What was that, you brat?!” Kagura playfully raised a fist.
Shinpachi laughed. This was more like the Gin-san they knew. It was reassuring to see him like this in his childhood. The kid almost looked cute enough to pat on the head, if not for the katana he held closely with him.
“Anyways, Shouyou,” the kid said, turning towards the older man, “I’m going to the dojo for bit. Do you know where that idiot Chibisugi is?”
Shouyou frowned slightly. “Gintoki, that’s not nice. Say his name properly, please.”
Gintoki sighed in exasperation. “Fine, fine, where’s that idiot Takasugi?”
Shouyou smiled this time. “Better, but not quite! I’m not telling you.”
“Che, guess that girly Zura will have to do…” Gintoki muttered, walking out and down the hall.
So that was how Gintoki knew Katsura. They went to the same school, huh? Shinpachi smiled. The nickname here would carry on for 15 years, well into their adult years.
Shouyou shook his head fondly in mock disapproval and turned back to his two guests.”You’ll have to forgive him. He’s cold to outsiders, but can often be pretty sweet. So, what brings you two here?”
“Just exploring, yup!” Kagura exclaimed enthusiastically.
“Yes, that’s right,” Shinpachi reiterated more formally. “We’ve just been wandering around a bit, learning about the world while we travel.” He hoped his story would pan out as Shouyou’s eyes perused them.
“Well, be careful, the warfront is near,” Shouyou warned. “In fact, I found Gintoki on the battlefield, so it’s not very far.”
Shinpachi didn’t ask any further, but he didn’t know why. He was curious, but felt this was a private matter shared between just Shouyou and Gintoki. Besides, he already knew Gintoki’s state of living beforehand.
“Thanks for your concern, Shouyou-san. We’ll be carful,” Shinpachi replied.
Shouyou nodded. “Are you in need of lodging for the night? We have a few free rooms at the school,” Shouyou smiled again. “Though, I have to warn you, the three kids might keep you awake.”
“Ah, that’s no problem, yup!” Kagura grinned.
Shouyou nodded. “That’s wonderful to hear. Though also,” his eyes suddenly turned cold as the temperature dropped a few degrees, “if any harm comes to my boys, you won’t see the light of day again.”
Shinpachi and even Kagura shivered. The way the man had said it, they knew that Shouyou was serious. He would no doubt follow through with those menacing words if anything happened.
But as if his eyes didn’t become those of a murderer’s for a second, the warm, welcoming atmosphere of the temple school was back and the man smiled kindly. What even was that? Shinpachi asked himself. He didn’t think that a kind man such as Shouyou could be like that. Though, he could recognise the change in mood anywhere, he realised, after being under Gin-san’s care.
Shinpachi thought fondly of his hopeless silver-haired boss for a bit, before his thoughts were interrupted by Shouyou standing up. “Would you like to see the school?” he asked the two. Kagura nodded in enthusiasm and excitement.
After a fairly thorough tour of the not-very-special-but-very-nicely-kept-and-homey temple school, they finally reached the dojo. Shinpachi was excited to see it, and to compare it to his own dojo.
It was relatively small, but the light filtering in through the open door gave the whole place a yellow glow. Wind blew in from one side, and left through the windows and door on the other side. Leaning against the wall were weapons, from bokuto’s to shinai’s, next to a rack of armor and padded clothing. On the other side of the room, students all dressed in white tops and customary navy-blue hakama’s sat, drained and sweaty from their training.
In the middle of the room, a match took place between a familiar mop of curly silver hair and another boy, with strikingly green eyes and purple-ish tinted black hair. It was intense, Shinpachi noted. The shinai would clash as sweat was flung off the two children’s faces, both moving at nearly inhuman speeds and in every which direction. Gintoki had more unpredictable moves and brute strength, but the other boy had the impeccable form and concentration to match.
And just as the two shinai were about to clash again, in a flash of silver dodging a thrust from the other boy’s shinai, a blow landed on his stomach’s right side, sending him flying a few feet.
A familiar wig of long, black hair called out, “Ippon!” as Gintoki and the other boy took deep breaths.
“Teme…” the boy grumbled from his now sitting position on the ground. “You were supposed to hold back, you knew you would win after you dodged anyways!”
“Ha! Takasugi, if you can’t withstand that then you’re hopeless. Plus, it was quick! How was I supposed to stop it in a split second?”
“Don’t kid yourself, I’ve seen you do it with the other kids before…”
Gintoki stuck his tongue out in a taunting manner.
“Don’t fight, guys…” The long-haired kid interrupted.
Both of them turned and said the same thing. “Shut up, Zura.”
“Not Zura, it’s Katsura,” the child sighed. “That makes the record 71 wins in Gintoki’s favor and 70 wins in Takasugi’s favor, for today.”
“9 more matches to go, you bastard, and Imma win all of ‘em!” Gintoki grinned, offering the boy on the ground a hand.
“I’ll say it again. Don’t kid yourself. I’m winning today,” Takasugi growled, taking it and standing back up.
Katsura sighed again.
Seeing them like this made Shinpachi and Kagura happy. They were the perfect image of brothers.
More than that, they were also slightly astounded that their lazy leader who never seemed to do anything but laze around readnig JUMP was actually training . But, well, they supposed his superhuman strength had to come from somewhere.
Shouyou tutted from behind them. “Friendly competition is great, but 150 matches? That’s taking it a bit far, Gintoki, Takasugi.”
All three children present (the author decided to completely ignore the background characters on the side that had no significance to the story whatsoever) visibly beamed when they saw their teacher, not unlike children opening up Christmas presents and finding what they wanted.
“Sensei, sensei, wasn’t Gintoki being mean?” Takasugi bounced to the man. “You saw the end of that match, right?”
“Che,” Gintoki scoffed. “Tattling to Shouyou, how mature. Anyways, Shouyou, could you spar with me? I think I can get you now.”
“Not now, Gintoki, we have guests.”
Takasugi stuck a tantalizing tongue out from next to his teacher.
That night, Shinpachi and Kagura went to bed content. They had seen the object of their worries surrounded by people who loved him, and he loved them equally back. It was a touching story; a man taking in a child called demon by others. And they got to see Gintoki as a child, happy, childish, lazy, and actually training. They knew the training would help so much in the future, in the face of the almost infinite enemies they would face together.
But until then, they felt good leaving him in the hands of the kind man known as Shouyou and the two other kids.
---
The images flashed through their mind like a dream, this time around. They weren’t even present.
Burning flames. Falling wood. The ringing as golden rings clashed with each other on staffs of people disguised as monks. The sinister face of a man with white hair and a scar on his face, with empty sunken eyes.
The students’ teacher being led away in ropes, as the silver-haired child called out after him.
And the pinky stuck out from the man’s bound hand, and Gintoki’s tears as the unheard words registered in his mind. His eyes filled with a new glint, this time determination and absolute loathing of crows.
The crows.
They would regret crossing the boy who became a man that night, the man who became a demon shortly after.
Or would the demon regret crossing the three-legged crows?
---
When they awoke again, they would find themselves back on a bloody battlefield, this time with the killing in the process, and not already done. This time, they witnessed the blood rain instead of the aftereffects.
The fresh blood coming off of the corpses around them smelled so much stronger than before.
This time, Shinpachi couldn’t hold in his lunch.
“What the h*ll are you two doing?!” Shouted a low voice. They turned to find Zura looking back at them, long hair tied and matted to his forehead with sweat, green haori drenched with blood. “Do you want to be killed? Hurry up and move!”
Shinpachi and Kagura couldn’t. They could only stare at the carnage around them, as men and Amanto alike dropped dead around them, like moths gathering too close to a flame.
Kagura crounched down with her hand around her head again. It’s not real, it’s not real, it’s not real, ITS NOTREAL ITSNOTREAL ITSNOTREAL she wanted to convince herself. The blood was drawing out her warrior’s senses, and screams and pleas of death filled her ears. Tears started building in her eyes, but there was no time to think, no time to do anything, as a samurai leaped up over her and was promptly swung away by Shinpachi’s bokuto.
“Kagura-chan.”
She nodded.
Now was not the time.
The two stood. And they slashed. They flailed. They waved their weapons around, hoping that they only rendered people unconcious, not dead, for to live with the sin on their hands, blood on their hands and clothes… was too much for the both of them to handle.
It was over. The rain swept through, washing away the red and the salty tears and overwhelming smell of the blood, but not completely because they, they would never be able to forget the lingering metallic smell of blood.
Shinpachi let out an ironic chuckle. It was like the heavens were crying over the increased population.
As they marched back with the rest of the soldiers, they wouldn’t see their silver-headed friend, mentor, parental figure anywhere.
For his easily recognizable white perm had turned flat and reddish-brown.
That night, the two of them huddled together, shuddering. It could’ve also been shivering, but they couldn’t tell. The smell of blood still surrounded them, the cries of the wounded reaching their covered ears.
They tried to close their eyes and shut out everything. This couldn’t have been real.
Except it was. In someone else they knew’s life.
And in the middle of that train of thought, before they had the chance to fully compute the fact that their kind lazy boss had experience all of this with a front-row seat, a warm, heavy futon blanket was dropped over their heads.
A familiar voice came from outside the futon. “If you can’t handle it, go back. No one’ll blame you,” it said.
Shinpachi stuck out his head almost reluctantly to see the familiar red eyes and silver perm outside of the comfort of the gray futon. The sight was comforting in a different way.
“How… how do you do it? How do you get rid of the screams and smell of blood?”
The man’s broad back cloacked in a white haori moved away, a hand familiarly rubbing the back of his head.
“I don’t.”
It became painfully clear that Gintoki was disliked in this place, as the other soldiers made scornful faces towards the white haori.
“Shiroyasha.”
“Demon.”
“He’s the only one that comes back alive from most missions.”
“Why did he live but Hiraga didn’t?”
“How can he kill with a straight face?”
“Why isn’t he bothered by the lives he took?”
“It’s not fair.”
“We have to deal with the guilt.”
“The blood on our hands.”
“The bloodcurdling screams.”
“The glazed-over eyes.”
“It’s not fair.”
“He truly is a demon.”
“ Shiroyasha. ’
Didn’t any of them even know the man’s true name? Sakata Gintoki, the lazy man who loved sweets? No, they were too busy seeing the demon on the battlefield, cowering behind his broad, blood-stained back.
The cycle went on. But this time,
This time Kagura couldn’t say anything back.
Yet, Shinpachi and Kagura still heard four other voices.
“Zura, gimme some yakult.”
“Get it yourself, Bakasugi.”
“Not Zura, It’s Katsura.”
“Ahahahahahaha! Kintoki!”
“Go die in a hole or learn my name correctly, b*stard.”
“Feel my pain! Gintoki!”
“Shut up, Zura.”
They smiled in spite of the circumstances.
---
Another vision came to them, in a dream.
The crows.
The teacher, at the head of a cliff.
The two friends, crying bloody murder. Crying for Gintoki to stop. Crying for their old lives back.
Crying as the demon turned human steeled his heart
and became demon once again.
As he walked up to the teacher,
The mentor,
The father,
And a ‘thank you’ reached his ears.
A head dropped to the ground.
Thud.
Screaming.
An eye lost.
Crying.
The silent demon, turned human again by his teacher’s last words.
Did he make the right choice?
They didn’t have time to cry. They didn’t have time to let it hit them.
The vision ran into the cold. Never to be brought up again.
A swirl. In the twilight, their beloved silver-haired boss claiming to be a man’s daughter.
Their boss being dragged away in ropes.
Their hands reached out like his once did, years ago when his teacher/mentor/ father was taken away.
They could do nothing. Their voices couldn’t be heard.
Not even when the man was tied in a chamber of sinsiter tools.
When the man was tortured this way and that.
When the man refused to scream or cry despite every nerve in his body screaming bloody murder.
But then, the wave of relief.
When the man bleeding from everywhere, gaunt and pale, was released by the kind reaper.
---
When they awoke, they were once again in Kabuki-cho.
But it was covered in snow, every inch the eye could see.
Everything was white. The gravestones were caked with heavy wet white. The ground crunched underfoot as feet depressed the heavy wet white. Only the area behind a certain grave wasn’t heavy wet white. It was heavier wetter red. But the man in a blue yukata on top of it wasn’t.
The man was white. Shivering. Caked in as much snow as the gravestones, close but not quite like the corpses beneath the whitened gravestones.
And the one who came along to help them was a familiar old lady with offerings for her late husband.
The man recovered.
Sometime, the dream broke and they were back where they started, but not quite because that was a long time ago.
The demon’s ice-cold white heart became stained.
This time not with the blood of his enemies, but the colorful personalities of those around him. The black of the plain boy. The tepid vermillion of the girl who had seen too much for her age.
Sometime, this stopped being the two learning about his past.
It became the two understanding all the hardships that he had gone through, the ghosts that haunted him and the past that kept creeping up on him.
But alas.
This wasn’t canon.
So they never remembered the journey again.
Sakata Gintoki.
He was, is, and would be loved by many.